Joan Entmacher, Vice President for Family Economic Security

Joan Entmacher is Vice President for Family Economic Security at the National Women's Law Center, where she leads a team working to improve policies important to the economic security of low-income women and their families, including tax and budget, child care, child support, unemployment insurance, Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, and Social Security. Ms. Entmacher is a leading expert on issues affecting low-income women. She has been invited to testify before Congress on several occasions, written numerous analyses and reports on income support policies and their impact on poor women, and spoken frequently at conferences, briefings, and to the media. Prior to joining the National Women's Law Center, Ms. Entmacher served as Director of Legal and Public Policy at the National Partnership for Women & Families, Assistant Professor of Political Science at Wellesley College, Chief of the Civil Rights Division of the Massachusetts Attorney General's Office, and attorney in the U.S. Department of Labor Solicitor's Office. Ms. Entmacher is a graduate of Yale Law School and Wellesley College.

The New Jersey legislature just passed a bill to raise the state's minimum wage and index it to keep pace with inflation. Now it's all up to Governor Christie. For this bill to become law, he just has to sign it.

So why are we worried? Governor Christie has threatened not to sign the bill.

That's why we need to turn the pressure up! Please take a second and call Governor Christie to let him know that hundreds of thousands of working New Jersey women need a raise.

An IRS report released the day before Thanksgiving shows that the very rich had something more to be thankful for. Tax rates fell in 2010 for every income group above $500,000. And the very wealthiest – those whose incomes exceeded $10 million in 2010 – saw the biggest drop in tax rates.

Taxpayers with incomes over $10 million paid an effective federal income tax rate of 20.7 percent in 2010, down from 22.4 percent in 2009. (The “effective” federal income tax rate refers to the percentage of adjusted gross income a taxpayer actually pays in federal income tax, after lower tax rates on certain kinds of income, deductions, exemptions, and credits are taken into account.) Taxpayers with incomes between $5 and $10 million paid an effective tax rate of 24.2 percent in 2010, down from 25.2 percent in 2009.

As a Wall Street Journal blog explains: “The reason for the drop in average tax rates [among the very wealthy] is no secret. It’s the special 15 percent top rates for capital gains and dividends that President George W. Bush pushed through.”

Whether served as a side dish or not, politics always seems to wiggle its way onto the Thanksgiving table. And because your family may not agree on everything (or anything), we want you to be as prepared for them as you are for the big meal.

And now that the election is over, the public debate is all about the so-called "fiscal cliff," which refers to the combination of tax cuts and numerous other provisions set to expire at the end of December plus a series of automatic spending cuts scheduled to begin in January.

Contrary to what some commentators might suggest, however, the economy won’t immediately fall into a recession if Congress doesn’t reach agreement on all of these issues by midnight on December 31. Indeed, real and lasting damage WILL be done if Members of Congress allow misguided fears to pressure them into a bad deal that cuts programs vital to women and families and fails to make the wealthiest among us pay their fair share in taxes.

To explain what this means for you – and for Aunt Edith – below are a few key myths and facts.

MYTH: If we raise taxes on the richest 2%, it will kill jobs.

FACT: We’ve seen that trickle-down economics doesn’t work. We had much stronger job growth after President Clinton raised taxes on the wealthiest Americans than after President Bush cut them. And, allowing the Bush-era tax cuts for the richest two percent to expire would generate nearly $1 trillion in savings. This much-needed revenue would allow us to call off the looming – and draconian – automatic cuts to programs that are also scheduled to take place. Plus, it would let us invest in human capital as well as physical infrastructure. When so many Americans can't find work, it's important to support programs that create good jobs and long-term economic growth.

This week is the 40th anniversary of the Supplemental Security Income program, SSI. We celebrate SSI’s vital role in providing support to the elderly poor and to poor adults and children with disabilities. It’s a particularly important program for women, who make up over two-thirds of all beneficiaries 65 and older.

Forty isn’t very old. Our Social Security system is 77, and it’s an American classic. But key parts of SSI have barely changed in the 40 years since it was enacted – and it urgently needs to be updated.

For example, with the exception of $20 per month, every additional $1 in Social Security benefits means $1 less in SSI benefits. This amount hasn’t been changed since the program was created 40 years ago – but what you can buy with $20 sure has. Adjusting for inflation since 1972 would raise this amount to $110 per month, allowing individuals with very low Social Security benefits – disproportionately women – to get a more meaningful benefit from their years of work and contributions to Social Security.

The Social Security Administration just made its annual announcement of what the cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) for Social Security would be in 2013. Drumroll, please: benefits will increase by 1.7 percent starting in January. For the typical single elderly woman whose monthly benefit is only $1,100, that amounts to $19 per month to meet the rising costs of food, gas – and health care.

No one who tries to make ends meet just on Social Security benefits – as millions of women do – would think that was too much.

The COLA is an important part of Social Security. It helps prevent the value of Social Security benefits from being eroded by inflation over time. But even the current COLA underestimates inflation for the elderly and people with disabilities because it doesn’t take account of their greater health care spending.